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[m_pinocchio]

He waits a little before he goes to find him. He takes the girls back, feeds them lunch, plays with them, puts them down for an afternoon nap and leaves Neil and Peter with them, and only then does he think he's ready. It takes him a little while to find Tom--not at the Compound, clearly not at the tree, but finally someone directs him down towards

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[out_of_realm]

Tom looked up from the book, Lord of the Rings and slow reading - and watched Mike carefully. He'd known it was him since the first moment he'd been able to hear his strides. After so many years of sharing so much...

He sighed shortly through his nose, dog earing the book and setting it aside.

"Sure." He paused. Swallowed. Rubbed his hand over his arm. "It's nice out, huh?"

[m_pinocchio]

"Yeah," he says with a faint smile. Weather. The old fallback. He sits down next to Tom, picks up the book and turns it over in his hands.

"I fucking loved this book in high school," he says. "Seemed so much more exciting than what I was dealing with. Go off to war, fight to defend Gondor..." He shakes his head. Reality had been so much different.

And yet, maybe not so much.

[out_of_realm]

"I'm still where the chubby little guy is getting the thing," Tom said, leaning back against the tree and closing his eyes.

"Don't spoil anything for me."

[m_pinocchio]

"Everyone dies," he says, still with that faint smile. "Not really." He settles back next to Tom, looking at him carefully. There are still plenty of times in this relationship where he's not entirely sure of his ground.

Maybe that's not unhealthy.

"So Neil said you and him kinda... got into it last night," he says quietly.